Immaterial
by Lioness's Heart
Summary: After Beka comes back from Port Caynn, Rosto decides that they need to have a little talk... SPOILERS FOR BLOODHOUND!


**Disclaimer: It isn't mine...end of story...  
A/N: Okay, so this is my last of the Bloodhound missing moments for the time being (my best friend has my book, at the moment, so it doesn't help matters), though this one is more of just the way I thought it should have been right after the end of the book. I'm pretty happy with this, and I would have posted it last night, but I went to a concert, so I didn't have time to completely finish it. And now that it's done, I've got another couple of things to write, and some fanfiction to catch up on... Enjoy and don't forget to review!

* * *

**

Dinner at the Dove, even among friends, was a noisy affair. But, no matter how he looked at it, Rosto was nearly alone in many ways. It brought to mind the thoughts that had run through his head repeatedly for days. He hid it well, but Rosto was still very unhappy, as he had been for nearly a week.

Nothing had helped. Nothing at all whatsoever – and for goodness sake, what had he been thinking? No doxy could hold his attention longer than it took for him to get bored of one of them draping herself over his shoulder or something of the like. And it was bloody irritating after a few minutes of that.

He was well aware of the mess he had made, and he honestly did not care just then. He would much rather be absorbed in his own thoughts and not remember. Besides, Rosto could see the jewelry that Beka wore – jewelry that she had not had before she had gone to Port Caynn. Every time he saw a flash of those opals, he felt a surge of jealousy. It reminded him that she had chosen someone else.

It wasn't something he was going to freely admit, but he hated Rowan, the cove who had taken Beka's heart away from him. If it wasn't for the man's existence, Rosto might have had a chance to win her as he had long hoped to. It frustrated him beyond what he had thought was possible. It was not every day that the Rogue did not get what he wanted.

The feeling of isolation crept in again as he let his eyes flick around the room, resting on anything and anyone but Beka. He was the outsider, as he had felt he had been half of his life. He had always hated that feeling, even though he was the one who brought it on most of the time.

Ersken had Kora sitting on his lap – she had suggested to him that they buy a house together; it made Rosto a bit sad to hear that. The five of them – him, Beka, Aniki, Kora, and Ersken – had lived in the same boarding house for a year and a half. Even if he had moved into the Dove, they were still very close, and it didn't seem like it was too far away for any of them to be.

Aniki…well, Aniki had moved on, too. She had been spending an ever increasing amount of time with Phelan. Rosto approved of her choice, but it made him feel lonely. It was because of that, as well as the sight of a number of couples in the room with Goodwin and her husband, Tunstall and Sabine, Kora and Ersken, and Aniki and Phelan, among others, in the room that made it all worse. He had noted that Beka's brothers and one of her sisters had come, as had a number of Dogs that had gone off to Port Caynn with Goodwin when she had gone back.

In the end, though, lonely and unhappy as he was, Rosto had managed to come to terms with the fact that Beka was with someone else and that she was once again the unattainable prize he craved. It was something that he would have to get over eventually, and now was a good time to start.

Finally, he let his gaze fall on Beka as he scanned the room. She stood talking to Sabine and Tunstall, as she had been for quite a bit of time. Rosto let his eyes close for a moment – he was in trusted company, so he felt he could do that if he kept his ears open for a surprise, though he didn't think there was one coming. A tap on his shoulder brought his attention back to reality. Kora, where she was sitting on Ersken's lap, was the source of the disruption. Rosto blinked at her for a moment.

"Are you all right, Rosto?" she asked softly, tilting her head slightly as she looked at him. Ersken's blue eyes were trained on Rosto as well. "Is something wrong?"

"What? Something wrong? No, never. Nothing's wrong, Kora. I'm just a little tired from moving all of my things here," he said, pulling the ready excuse from the air. Kora studied him for a moment with level brown eyes.

"If you say so…" she murmured, but she continued to watch him as she spoke in hushed voices with Ersken. Rosto chuckled under his breath. It was so easy to fool her, to fool anyone in the room, even the Dogs. Even Beka.

He had fooled her for over a year into thinking that he was only flirting with her. He had been so _stupid_, he told himself, for doing that. He had let her get out of his reach because of it. Rosto could feel his anger – at himself, her, the Pells, Rowan, and everything that had gone on recently – bubble up inside of him again.

With an inward sigh, Rosto tried to push it away. It wouldn't do him any good. Nor would acting like a love-sick pup who wasn't allowed to have what he wanted. It was clear that he was going to have to accept it anyway. If Beka honestly did not want his attention, he would have to give it up as a lost cause. Besides, could they really be together, anyway?

Rosto let his hand fall to one of his belt knives and pulled it out of the sheath. He considered the silvery blade for a moment before pulling a whet stone out of his pocket and sharpening the edge until it was satisfactory. By then, everyone had begun to move toward the tables for dinner, which the serving girls had started to bring in. He carefully slid the dagger back into the sheath and slipped the stone back into his pocket. He stared at the wood of the table for a moment before he heard the chair next to him slide against the floor.

It was a moment before he looked up to see that it was Beka who had taken the chair next to him. Their eyes met seconds later and he smiled slightly, but said nothing. She held up her hands in a gesture that only he could see – making a small motion toward the other chairs at their table and the other that was in use. All of them were full, he noted when his eyes flicked to each of them respectively. It was like it had been orchestrated so that the two of them ended up sitting next to each other. Rosto rolled his eyes and she chuckled under her breath.

During dinner, neither of them said much to the other, seemingly having come to an unspoken agreement between the two of them that they would talk afterwards. Alone. He did note, though, that Beka was more withdrawn and laid back than she had been before. It made him wonder what in the world had happened to her at Port Caynn that he didn't know about. That made him a tad annoyed, because he wasn't one who liked to be in the dark about anything – that was the whole reason he had sent a runner to the port over a week before.

Rosto was content with the chit-chat that went on around him for the moment, knowing that he would get a chance to have a better conversation with Beka later. When he was done, he paused, glancing at her before he rose.

"I'll meet you outside when you're done," he said softly as he got to his feet. She acknowledged it with barest nod of her head and he departed, making his way up to his own room so that no one would know where he was. He locked the door behind him and went to work on a few things to keep himself busy while he waited. A few moments later, his work done, he slipped out the window and onto the roof.

It was easy enough to get down without making too much noise or attracting much attention. It helped, he supposed, that there were a large number of people inside the Dove at the moment. He walked quietly over to Mistress Trout's lodgings, smiling to himself as he let his eyes run over the familiar building. He sighed and waited for a moment.

Beka appeared not long after he did. She walked over to him, where she stopped and looked up the scant two inches of difference between their heights. With darkness having fallen and the light from the Dove illuminating her from behind, it was harder for him to see her face.

"What did you want to say, Rosto?" she asked. Her voice was somewhat resigned, like she would rather not have been there. "It had best be quick, else they'll come looking for me if I'm gone too long," she said. Rosto shook his head and motioned for the two of them to go inside where there was no crowd. Beka let out a sigh and led him up to her room, where she closed the door. "Better?"

"Yes. I'm sorry to tear you away, but it didn't seem to be the proper place for the two of us to talk with so many people about," he said. Beka nodded as she lit one of the candles in her room. She looked at him in the faint light and waited.

"There isn't much to talk about, Rosto," she said after a moment. "We left, we sniffed, we chased, we won," she said. Rosto raised both eyebrows.

"That isn't the only thing that happened. I know that, Beka. I sent a runner in Port Caynn to find out what was going on. I don't like being in the dark, whether it's by accident or it was planned. I know there was more," he said, hooking two fingers of each hand through his belt.

"Then what is there to talk about if you know the rest of it," she asked nonchalantly, blinking her blue-grey eyes at him.

"I want to hear it from you, not a runner who might have misheard," Rosto replied. He tilted his head as he looked at her. She wiped her palms on her leggings as she watched him.

"You know about what happened with me and Dale. Ersken told me – he said you were as mad as a bear, you know. More precisely, he said that you were mad as a bear with a thorn in his paw, among other things," Beka responded. The look on her face never changed. Rosto felt spots burn on his cheeks when she said that.

_'So, the little blabbermouth's told her about my reaction, has he? I'll deal with him later,'_ Rosto thought to himself as he let his eyes fall from Beka's face to the floorboards. "And what else did he tell you?" he asked.

"That you weren't pining, exactly, but you were making a bit of a mess of things…only he said it more brazenly…and he said that you weren't happy…" Rosto snorted in response, thinking of ways that he could take revenge on the other man. Ersken was going to pay for that.

"Well, he would be correct on that count," Rosto admitted through clenched teeth. "I was not pleased to hear about you and the bank courier.

"I'm not a possession, Rosto, and I'm not yours," Beka told him. "I can do as I wish without asking for your permission." Rosto sighed.

"I know that, Beka. It's just…" he trailed off, closing his eyes and leaning his head back. He did not want to go on, for fear that it would just push her away even more.

"It's just what?" she prompted a moment later, putting her hands on her hips. Rosto opened his eyes and looked back at her.

"I don't like the idea of you with someone else," he growled, looking away again as he crossed his arms over his chest.

"Why not? I'm not yours, might I remind you…"

"I know that! You know why," he said. Beka raised her eyebrows, her eyes watching his face intently as he stared resolutely at the floor two feet away from his boots. He sighed and looked back up at her, his black eyes boring right through her. "I keep telling you but you never listen to me," he said finally. "Is your courier going to be visiting you often?" Beka looked at him thoughtfully after the sudden question.

"I don't think so. It didn't work out between us, but we're friends. His business takes him in the opposite direction from Corus mostly," she told him quietly. She followed suit and sighed, looking away.

"You know, I'm always here, Beka," Rosto told her, his expression softening. Beka smiled a little.

"I know you are, Rosto. You're a good friend, but it never would have worked between us," she said.

"Why not?" he asked, tilting his head and regarding her with a look that she made her slightly uncomfortable.

"Because you're the Rogue and I'm a Dog," she said simply. "We can never be anything more than friends because of that." Rosto rolled his eyes.

"That is no excuse," he said. "My throne is immaterial, and I would give it up for you. The immaterial is simply immaterial, Beka. I want to know what_ you _think, not what you have to say because of your job. What do you think of _me_? Of my offer?" he asked. Beka stared at him.

"You would…you would give it all up? For me? Why?" she asked, a frown forming on her face. Rosto hesitated for several moments. Should he tell her? He wondered for another moment before he decided and took a deep breath.

"Because I….I love you, Beka…" he said. She blinked at him for a moment. He flushed bright red and turned to disappear. Her expression had told him all that he needed to know. She didn't want it, and he wasn't one to force himself on a mot like that.

"Wait….Rosto…" Her quiet voice called him back and he turned. "Don't go yet," she continued. He nodded, but said nothing for a moment.

"What?" he asked softly, dark brown eyes flicking between her and the floor for the uncomfortable moment of silence.

"Rosto, I'm not ready for another relationship right now," she told him. His heart fell even more as the words echoed in his mind. She walked over to where he stood and placed her hand on his cheek. "But when I am, I would like to try. With you," she said. A half-smile appeared on Rosto's lips for a moment.

"And I'll wait for you," he replied softly. "I'll wait forever for you, Beka." That made her smile.

"I won't make you wait that long," she told him. There was a wicked twinkle in her eyes when she said that.

"It won't be long at all, love, if I get to look forward to having you at my side," he said. He leaned closer to her and kissed her forehead softly. "Now, you should get back to your friends and family. They'll be wondering where you've gotten to," he told her.

"You won't be coming with me?" Beka asked, taking a step back to look at him again.

"No, silly gixie. I have work to do. But I'll see you at breakfast tomorrow," he replied. "Good night, Beka," he continued softly before he disappeared out the door to return to the Dove.

"Good night, Rosto…"


End file.
